Snowflakes are falling

I ran across this tutorial for cutting out snowflakes the other day on Pinterest, which is perfect because I was just trying to show Joc how to cut out snowflakes from paper last week! I knew I wasn't doing something quite right with them and since I've found this one we've made a ton more that are really pretty!

These are another of those fun activities your kids could be doing while you're cooking this week for Thanksgiving and you could lay them out around the tables or on your buffet as cute hand made decorations for your guests to see!

The kids will love that, it'll bring them into the center of the attention for a short period of time during the day while their grandparents, aunts, uncles... comment on the snowflakes they made!

Here is the link for the print out of the tutorials:

Winter Is Coming!

 

This is a view of what the print out looks like... And who doesn't love Elsa and Olaf!

- Stephanie

Christmas is Coming....

So.... I promise y'all that I'm not one of those people that completely skips over Thanksgiving. I love Thanksgiving! It's one of my favorite holidays. I don't have my tree up already, I don't have a single decoration out yet for Christmas. I do have tons of pumpkins and pilgrims and scarecrows around, though! :)

All that being said, I'm sharing some fun looking Christmas themed activities for the kiddos to do in the coming days and weeks of no school for the holidays!

Here is the link for the activities: Christmas Time is Here You'll remembering doing some of these things from when you were a kid, too! But while you're slaving away in the kitchen preparing dishes for Thanksgiving in a few weeks the kids can entertain themselves while watching the Macy's parade that morning instead of complaining about being bored!

Here are a few of the crafts from this post:

Giant Popsicle snowflakes! 

These look really fun to make with your kids! I honestly can't wait to make these with Joc and hang them up around the house this season!

I made these when I was a kid! 

Super easy Christmas tree ornaments they can make (while you're cooking!) Just lay down some paper for them to work on and give them plenty of pretties to decorate with and then they can make tons of them! Not a bad idea for a handmade present for friends and family members from them either! :)

Cinnamon applesauce heart ornaments! 

I can NOT wait to make these! I bet they smell AMAZING while you're baking them!! These would make great gifts for some family members as well! I'm thinking of making them with Joc one day in mid December and then tying them onto gifts for people! 

Here is the direct link to make these heavenly things: Katy Elliott

There are so many more than just these to go and check out and do with your kids or have them do while you're working on other things!

Enjoy! :D

-Stephanie

Night Night... Sleep Tight

Do you ever have issues getting your little ones to go to bed or sleep? I do, some times. She's gotten a TON better over the years, now that she's realized that she doesn't miss out on anything while she's sleeping, and since she's realized she NEEDS her sleep, she no longer cares too much!

However, this particular blog, Kid's Activity Blog, would have been pretty handy to have had back in the day of fighting a monster of a child while putting her to bed. She lists some truly great ideas for helping to calm your children down during bed time to ease them off to dream land.

Among these really awesome ideas was this:

A glowing sensory bottle!

How cute is that?! I love this idea. Mainly because it's not a game or anything that they have to play with to calm them down. They can keep this by their beds and play with it as they fall asleep, and it still eases their minds as they stare into the stars and glitter!

So, here's the website on how to make this super awesome bed time object:

Glowing Sensory Bottle

What you'll need:

1. DURABLE plastic bottle
2. Hair Gel, fill the bottle to nearly full bottle.
3. Glitter Glue, use a squirt.
4. Glow in the dark paint, another squirt.
5. Super Glue, for the lid!
6. Glow-in-the-dark mini stars. (I have found some of these at Wal-mart.)

 Mix it all up and give it a good shake, after you glue the top on of course, and watch the magic! :)

My sweet girl might be a smidgen too old for this, but I still plan on making it with her! I think she'll love it and it'll still be helpful for her to fall asleep on those nights where she really fights it still.

-Stephanie

Cute and Creepy Holiday Doors

Check out these super cute Halloween door decorations! I can't wait for fall you guys! It's my FAVORITE time of the year! Hot chocolate, beautiful colors, cooler weather, pumpkin everything, sweaters and jackets! Oh, and HOLIDAYS!!! :D

I'm so ready for the holidays to be here. I know, it's still only August, but school's back in session and (here anyway) it's been a bit cooler feeling in the early mornings and such and I'm just ready!

So... to help keep me calm until it's an appropriate time to start decorating I've been planning my decorating. (I totally asked my husband if I could go on and start decorating for the fall... I got a big no, of course.)

Here is a cute idea I found that I'm adding to my list of decorations for this year's Halloween:

 

I just love these guys! And, I mean, how much easier could they be to make... All you need is some streamers of your color choice and construction paper/paper plates, and some good tape!

Here is the website to check out a few more ideas other than these creepy guys: Spooky Doors

Y'all, enjoy the end of the summer months while they're here! I'll try to make the most of them! :P

-Stephanie

A Little Summer Treat

I came across this fun treat that you can make with your little ones the other day. They're called Ice Cream Pops! We actually made ours yesterday and they turned out fantastic! They were SO yummy! And, of course, very fun to make. Joc enjoyed doing all of the sprinkling.

What you need:

1. Ice cream, we used vanilla. But I was informed next time we have to use chocolate. :)
2. Chocolate syrup or Nutella. We used the syrup for ours.
3. Caramel sauce.
4. Crunched up toffee bits or hazelnuts. I found a bag of Hershey's/Toll House toffee and chocolate for baking that I used. It worked great.
5. Chopped up chocolate bits. We used Hershey's morsels.
6. Chopped almonds.
7. Paper cups.
8. Popsicle sticks.

Once you have all the ingredients that you want for your pops, alternate each dry ingredient with a layer or your ice cream of choice into the cups. Once filled to the top, stick in your popsicle stick and then place them on a tray in your freezer. Keep them in there for about two hours and they should be ready to enjoy!
And, of course, you don't have to follow my ingredients. Be creative and use your own set of tasty ingredients for your pops! I think next time we're doing a chocolate themed one with all chocolate ingredients! Chocolate ice cream, chocolate syrup, chocolate sprinkles, chocolate chips... ect. I can't wait!

It's Coming... SUMMER!

Either summer has already started for you and your busy family or it's on the brink... We have one week left and then we're done for a few months. I'm SO not ready! I've been compiling a list of things to do this summer with our little one. In the process I've found a lot of really great websites to go off of for local events and such!
Maybe you're in the same boat... Looking for things to do. And lets face it, you can't go and do something every single day to keep your kids occupied! (If you can, go you!) Everything costs so much these days. We're planning on going to do something really great, like, once a week. On the other days we may just go to the park or the zoo, we have a membership so it's free to go at this point for us. (By the way, I HIGHLY recommend getting a membership at your local zoo or park. It is an amazing way to go kill time, do something fun, and get out doors! We LOVE our zoo membership, and the price was fantastic!)
Anyway, we also have a brand new splash-pad opening up this summer, which I fully plan on visiting often! 

If you live in the Birmingham, AL area or those around here this is a great website that I check out all the time to find fun things to do around here for me and my love and my little one.
Check it out: Birmingham365 This website is pretty up to date on anything and everything going on in our great city! I urge you, if you don't live near here, to go look for a similar website for your area... This has been a life saver for us here!

Maybe you already know what you and your family will be doing this summer, maybe your calendar is FULL of exciting things to do... Bravo! (I envy you, please give me your list :D)
If you're that mom, or dad, and you have your summer planned but still are missing something here is a list for you! I found this recently, it's a list of websites for kids to use to keep their brains going over the summer. To keep them going and learning. A lot of kids NEED this during the summer! That long gap can really hinder some children with their learning, they forget things and don't continue to learn and then they get back into school in the fall and they're playing a small game of catch up.

 

Here is a more comprehensive list, briefly explaining what your kids can do on each website: (sorry it's a little blurry. :/)

These websites are excellent resources to use during the summer to keep your kiddos interesting in learning and broadening their horizons!

I plan on using these with Joc a couple of times a week. Maybe while I'm cooking dinner or needing to do some cleaning, I'll set her up with one of these websites to keep her occupied until I'm finished with whatever it is that I'm doing! I found this wonderful list over on A Year of My Firsts blog... Lots of other neat things to peruse through over there! :)

I hope I could help you with some of your summer planning, if you needed it! The most important thing is to just spend time with your little ones while you can! They cherish that more than anything while they're young!

-Stephanie

Bare Feet Welcome

I found a picture of a spring time wreath on Pinterest a while back... it was adorable! I couldn't wait to make it! And now that I finally have, I've been dieing to share it with all of y'all! :)

Here is my finished wreath:

Isn't it cute???!!

It was so simple to make! Here is what you'll need:

1. Hot glue (of course!)

2. Flower "lace" found at Walmart for nearly nothing! I think I had them cut about 20 flowers in length.

3. Long ball point pins. Use the pink tipped ones!

4. Hard foam wreath.

5. Green feather boas. I got the fuzzier ones to make it appear more as grass. Also, I only got two boas and I ended up having to kinda stretch them pretty far in between loops, I'd recommend getting three for yours!! I found these at Hancock Fabrics, they were a little pricy, but I REALLY wanted to make this wreath! :)

Take the end of the boa and glue it to the wreath for stability. Then just wrap it all around until the end of the line. Glue the end down and then repeat with your second and third boas. DO NOT glue the boa anywhere else around the wreath!!! It'll just end up being a huge mess!

 

Cut the flowers so that they are individual flowers now, instead of a rope of them. Then take your pink tipped pins and push them through the middles of the flowers and place them where you like around your wreath. 

Be sure to push a few in through the boa's centers so that they won't move around as much anymore!

 Here is my wreath with all my flowers pinned down!

I also added a little sign that I made! It reads "Bare feet welcome!"

It's made out of a toothpick and some card stock cut out into a "flag" shape. I did the flag shape double sided and then folded it over the toothpick so it would hold better and glued the two sides together around the toothpick.

Here is my completed wreath! Just needs a pretty little ribbon! My Walmart currently has all their spring ribbon on sale, as well! :D

 

I love this wreath!! Even on gloomy days or cold days even, it makes it feel like spring time around my home!! And my 5-year-old think it's just "the most prettiest" thing ever! (Wait till she sees my Easter wreath I'm working on!)

Happy spring y'all!!

-Stephanie